Support

Answers to FAQs

How do I sign up for the course?

Does the course take a full six weeks?

It doesn’t have to, but six weeks seems a good amount of time to work through all of the videos and complete all of the creative projects while building out your online portfolio with your favorite images. You could zip through the whole thing much faster, but I suggest taking your time and really enjoying it. Six weeks can go by real fast when you’re learning to apply all of these new ideas and finding ways of really making them your own. But REMEMBER: you have access to this course FOR LIFE. So you can come back as often as you like, for as long as you like. You may want to come back to review a technique, grab some new bonus content, download a file you misplaced, or just get inspired for your next composition. Point is — you have access to everything FOREVER.

What version of Photoshop do I need?

I think you should be good to go with any version from Photoshop 7 onward. I did the majority of my work in Photoshop CS3, although the videos are shot mostly with Photoshop CS6. But no worries if you have an earlier version. Also, Elements is great too. Probably a quarter of the students in the course are using PSE and having a great time. (In fact, I’m even planning to expand with more and more Elements-specific videos. So the course will get even more Elements-friendly as we go along.)

Will you be providing me with images to work with during the course?

Apart from the bonus content (textures and backgrounds, rendered vector graphics, and custom brushes), you will also have access to some of the images used in the course itself — but really, we want you to be using your own images, creating your own art. In the very first module you will be learning how to “harvest an image library,” and very rapidly you will find you have far more content to work with than you know what to do with. It all builds up quickly! And beyond this, I will also be showing you how you can tap into some truly excellent creative commons images on Flickr to use for practice content while practicing the various techniques in the course.

Will I be able to download the videos?

Unfortunately we haven’t yet been able to set up the videos to be downloadable. Two reasons for that: First, with about 2,000 students in the course now, if things were made downloadable (given over 60 videos of this size, on top of about 5 gigabytes of bonus content already available for download) it would inevitably crash our server. Repeatedly. Second, with a course like this, as popular as it is, making downloads available would rapidly lead to someone pirating the entire course. The good news is, all of the videos stream very rapidly. And with a simple app, you can download entire videos to a tablet or iPad and watch them later without worrying about an internet connection or Wi-Fi. On top of this, the plan is to make a DVD set available soon as well. Anyone with an existing membership would get the DVDs at a massive discount, basically to cover the cost of production and shipping. (Anyone not in the course would have to pay full price, which will be at least $297, perhaps $497.) So there’s that option as well, although getting in on the digital version first is probably the best way to go.

Will the videos play on my iPad or iPhone?

Yep. You may want to flip the device sideways to show the videos in landscape view, but everything should play with no problem.

What payment methods do you accept?

You can use Master Card, Visa, American Express, Discover, or PayPal. Whichever you like.

I enrolled in the course, but never received the Password?

Check your spam folder first. Maybe the email got sent there. If you still can’t find it, email us at the support email up at the top right of this page. We will get it sorted out for you.

I lost my Username and Password, how can I recover those?

Check your past email (or maybe your spam folder) and you may find the original email that contained your user name and password. If you still can’t find it, email us at the support email up at the top right of this page. We will get it sorted out for you.

My Username and Password don't seem to be working?

Check your past email (or maybe your spam folder) and you may find the original email that contained your user name and password. If you still can’t find it, email us at the support email up at the top right of this page. We will get it sorted out for you.

I can't play the videos!

You probably just need to download the most recent version of the Adobe Flash Player (and maybe the Quicktime Player while you’re at it). These are both free. Just go to Google and do a web search for “Adobe Flash Player” and then “Quicktime Player” — these will pull up links for you to use in downloading these video player programs. You may need to close out your browser when you are done and then re-open it and log back in. But that should have you up and running. (If you still run into problems, try a different browser. If you are in Firefox, try Safari or Internet Explorer. If you are in Internet Explorer, try Safari or Chrome. Another browser could resolve the whole problem.

My video has playback problems (slow, stuck, stuttering, etc)?

You may just need to let the video buffer half a minute or so before pressing play. Some of these videos are pretty large! Or it could be your connection or your browser. Start there. Try opening up the site in a new browser (Firefox or Safari or Chrome maybe?), check your internet connection, and give it another go. It’s also possible (though unlikely, since we host our videos on the Amazon server) that there’s just a bit of server lag. Give it a few minutes, log out, log back in, and see if the problem corrects itself.

Will you answer my personal questions and critique my work?

Time permitting, sure! Just email me at info@photoshopgrunge.com and I will do my best. Depending on where we are at in the 6-week course, I suspect there will be times when I’m getting more email than others. But I’ll try to write back to everyone I can, as quickly as I can.

What if the course turns out to be too complex for me?

I don’t think you will run into that, since I really try to cover everything in plenty of detail. You may need to watch a certain video twice, pausing along the way to follow along in Photoshop yourself, but there’s nothing here you can’t learn. That said, if you DO feel it’s too complex, see the next question.

What if I decide I want to claim a refund?

This course is totally risk-free. If it’s not for you, if you don’t feel you’ve gotten any value from it, then by all means, I’m happy to refund your money. Just email me at info@photoshopgrunge.com and I’ll get you taken care of right away.

Submit Question

Have questions? Check the FAQ’s to the left first (there’s a good chance your question is over there), though if you don’t see it addressed there, go ahead and email us at: info@photoshopgrunge.com and we will be happy to get back to you.